Marketing Fruit - Weighing your Options
by Tim Clymer
How you intend to market your fruit is central to your business plan. What difference will an “Organic” sticker make in sales potential? You may have the desire to sell it all from the farm stand on your property to fetch a top price, but is that realistic given your farm’s location and the volume of fruit you would need to sell? For farms in more suburban areas with higher traffic flow that may be an option. Here we’ll discuss the benefits and drawbacks to different marketing options.
A Word on Certifications: Organic and Food Safety
Organic certification may open the door to certain marketing avenues. Even if you grow according to organic practices, larger buyers may want to see organic certification as a guarantee that you’re growing “by the book.” Additionally, consumers who are very committed to organic may look for the organic certification symbol as a guarantee that the food they are buying has in fact been grown following strict organic guidelines. There are also food safety certifications required in order to sell to larger markets like wholesale distributors and grocery stores.
From a business perspective organic certification requires additional knowledge, resources, and time inputs. Is the added expense and time worth it? From a purely business perspective, going organic may open marketing doors not open to conventionally grown fruit. Very often markets have or can get all the conventionally grown fruit they can sell. By contrast, nearly every market is looking for organic fruit. Locally grown, high quality organic fruit is especially in short supply. An organic label makes your fruit stand out when there is an abundance of conventional fruit in the marketplace. The organic label becomes an effective marketing tool which is foundational to a business plan, but only if the additional costs are justified by the additional premium that the organic fruit commands in the marketplace.
Marketing Options - Retail versus Wholesale
Retail Option #1
Farm Stand
Benefits - High price point, on site
Drawbacks - Dependent on traffic flow, seasonality, need for variety, small volume sales, need for staffing
Farm stands can be as simple as an unmanned table displaying produce by the roadside or as complex as a fully staffed building. They offer the price benefits of a farmers market with the benefits of a permanent location. Organic certification may make your stand a point of destination for consumers.
Our Farm Stand Experience at Threefold Farm
For Threefold Farm, our unmanned farm stand helped through the initial startup years when the amount of produce we had was relatively low. Because we live along a relatively busy road, the amount of traffic flow we receive makes it relatively easy for folks to swing in and pick up some produce.
Because much of our produce is highly perishable, any leftover produce at the end of the day needed to be frozen or was composted. And though the stand was unmanned, we needed to have someone restock it throughout the day, empty the cash box, and do inventories so that the sales could be tracked. It is questionable as to whether the additional premium we receive is now worth the effort.
Additionally, there are times of the year when our variety at the farm stand is fairly low. Will someone really stop by when we only have raspberries and tomatoes as fresh produce?
We will continue to operate the farm stand seasonally for our unusual fruits. Fruits like pawpaws, kiwi berries, and figs draw folks in because they’re often not available at the grocery store and we can sell them in significant quantities that make tasks like restocking and inventory worth the time and trouble.
Retail Option #2
Farmers Market
Benefits - Price point, high volume, relationships with customers
Drawbacks - Somewhat weather-dependent, need for market infrastructure, supplies, and equipment in addition to time commitments on nights and weekends
Farmers markets seem to be a go-to for small farm marketing. They allow the farmer a higher price point for their product and allow the farmer to form relationships with customers over time.
Markets require a significant investment of time and resources for the farmer: transport, display setups, tents, payment hardware, etc.
Many farmers markets take place toward the evening or on weekends, eating into valuable free time. Poor weather can eat into sales (or eliminate them altogether). Does the amount you’re paying your market staff justify the market table’s higher price point?
Wholesale Option #1
Restaurants
Benefits - Price point, low to moderate volume, increased farm visibility
Drawbacks - Delivery logistics, communication, sales, and inventory management
Restaurants can provide a great outlet for moderate volumes of produce. Price points are certainly less than retail but generally higher than selling through higher volume outlets like grocery stores. Our unique fruits also provide restaurants with a marketing advantage; chefs love unique flavors, interesting menu items, and flavorful fruit. Many chefs will also consider purchasing seconds for preserving and processing if they get a break on price.
Seeing your farm’s name and produce on a menu or displayed in a dining room may even be the way that many folks are first introduced to your farm. Many farm-to-table restaurants are proud to list you as a vendor and might even promote your fruit through their website or social media presence.
To cut down on overhead, we set a minimum order amount and only deliver two days a week to a fairly small delivery radius. Ensure that the costs associated with communication and the logistics of delivery make financial sense for your farm.
Wholesale Option #2
Food Hubs, CSAs, Grocery Stores & Distributors
Benefits - Moderate to high volume, someone else’s job to sell
Drawbacks - Price point, certifications necessary, packaging constraints
To move significant volumes of produce without marketing it yourself, your orchard will need to work with some kind of distributor. Some fruit farms have collaborated with neighboring vegetable farms by offering their tree fruit and berries as an add-on "fruit share" for a pre-existing CSA. Local food hubs work to aggregate food from a variety of local farms, providing access to the variety and convenient one-stop type of shopping that many consumers seem to prefer. And grocery stores and distributors can be a great outlet if you’re willing to jump through hoops like food safety certifications. It’s imperative, due to the lower price point you’ll likely receive through these outlets, that you understand your cost of production and that you don’t sell your fruit for less than it costs to produce.
Flexibility in Markets
It’s a cliché saying by now, but the only constant is change. Your markets will change over time. Restaurants will change chefs and those chefs will have different preferences. Businesses come and go and consumer attitudes and behaviors shift. Farms and farm inventory changes based on weather, staff, and stages of life. It’s best that the grower be willing to re-evaluate markets seasonally in order to determine if current marketing outlets are sustainable and if any further changes are anticipated.
As the recent pandemic has shown, it’s imperative to be flexible and creative in terms of marketing. At Threefold Farm we evaluate our markets each and every year (and sometimes more often). We ask ourselves whether a certain outlet is worth it in terms of the costs associated and we shift our strategy if it makes sense. As a result of our priorities, we’ve seen our sales shift from mostly on-farm to mostly wholesale.